The North Pole | Page 3

SHELTER 290 PEARY'S IGLOO AT
CAMP MORRIS K. JESUP, APRIL 6, 1909; THE MOST
NORTHERLY HUMAN HABITATION IN THE WORLD 291
MEMBERS OF THE PARTY CHEERING THE STARS AND
STRIPES AT THE POLE, APRIL 7, 1909 294 RETURNING TO
CAMP WITH THE FLAGS, APRIL 7, 1909 294 THE FOUR NORTH
POLE ESKIMOS 295 EGINGWAH SEARCHING THE HORIZON
FOR LAND 298 PEARY SEARCHING THE HORIZON FOR LAND
298 LOOKING TOWARD CAPE CHELYUSKIN 299 LOOKING
TOWARD SPITZBERGEN 299 LOOKING TOWARD CAPE
COLUMBIA 299 LOOKING TOWARD BERING STRAIT 299

ATTEMPTED SOUNDING, APRIL 7, 1909 302 ACTUAL
SOUNDING, FIVE MILES SOUTH OF THE POLE, APRIL 7, 1909,
1500 FATHOMS (9000 ft.) NO BOTTOM 303 SWINGING AN ICE
CAKE ACROSS A LEAD TO FORM AN IMPROMPTU BRIDGE
308 PASSING OVER THE BRIDGE 309 SOUNDING 312
BREAKING CAMP. PUSHING THE SLEDGES UP TO THE TIRED
DOGS 312 LAST CAMP ON THE ICE ON THE RETURN 313
BACK ON THE "GLACIAL FRINGE" 313 APPROACHING THE
PEAKS OF CAPE COLUMBIA OVER THE SURFACE OF THE
"GLACIAL FRINGE" 318 CRANE CITY AT CAPE COLUMBIA,
ON THE RETURN 318 EGINGWAH BEFORE STARTING ON THE
SLEDGE TRIP 319 EGINGWAH AFTER THE RETURN FROM
THE TRIP 319 OOTAH BEFORE STARTING ON THE SLEDGE
TRIP 319 OOTAH AFTER THE RETURN FROM THE SLEDGE
TRIP 319 PERMANENT MONUMENT ERECTED AT CAPE
COLUMBIA TO MARK POINT OF DEPARTURE AND RETURN
OF NORTH POLE SLEDGE PARTY 324 PEARY CAIRN AT CAPE
MORRIS K. JESUP AS PHOTOGRAPHED BY MACMILLAN AND
BORUP 325 MEMORIAL ERECTED TO THE MEMORY OF
PROFESSOR ROSS G. MARVIN AT CAPE SHERIDAN 325 THE
SPECIAL GREAT GOLD MEDAL OF THE NATIONAL
GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY OF WASHINGTON 364 THE SPECIAL
GREAT GOLD MEDAL OF THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL
SOCIETY OF LONDON 365
NOTE.--The general plan of illustration is based on an unusually close
adherence to the negatives, as giving more interesting and valuable
results. Many of the most important pictures are from photographs not
retouched in the least, e.g., those facing pages 270, 284, 290, etc. In
others the sky-line has been indicated, e.g., those facing pages 208, 271,
299 (top), etc.; but change of no other sort has been made except to
remove specks and other similar mechanical defects not widely
extended. The color-plates are, of course, exceptions requiring special
treatment. THE PUBLISHERS

FOREWORD

The struggle for the North Pole began nearly one hundred years before
the landing of the Pilgrim Fathers at Plymouth Rock, being inaugurated
(1527) by that king of many distinctions, Henry VIII of England.
In 1588 John Davis rounded Cape Farewell, the southern end of
Greenland, and followed the coast for eight hundred miles to Sanderson
Hope. He discovered the strait which bears his name, and gained for
Great Britain what was then the record for the farthest north, 72° 12´, a
point 1128 miles from the geographical North Pole. Scores of hardy
navigators, British, French, Dutch, German, Scandinavian, and Russian,
followed Davis, all seeking to hew across the Pole the much-coveted
short route to China and the Indies. The rivalry was keen and costly in
lives, ships, and treasure, but from the time of Henry VIII for three and
one-half centuries, or until 1882 (with the exception of 1594-1606,
when, through Wm. Barents, the Dutch held the record), Great Britain's
flag was always waving nearest the top of the globe.
The same year that Jamestown was founded, Henry Hudson (1607),
also seeking the route to the Indies, discovered Jan Mayen,
circumnavigated Spitzbergen, and advanced the eye of man to 80° 23´.
Most valuable of all, Hudson brought back accounts of great multitudes
of whales and walruses, with the result that for the succeeding years
these new waters were thronged with fleets of whaling ships from every
maritime nation. The Dutch specially profited by Hudson's discovery.
During the 17th and 18th centuries they sent no less than 300 ships and
15,000 men each summer to these arctic fisheries and established on
Spitzbergen, within the Arctic Circle, one of the most remarkable
summer towns the world has ever known, where stores and warehouses
and reducing stations and cooperages and many kindred industries
flourished during the fishing season. With the approach of winter all
buildings were shut up and the population, numbering several thousand,
all returned home.
Hudson's record remained unequaled for 165 years, or until 1773, when
J. C. Phipps surpassed his farthest north by twenty-five miles. To-day
the most interesting fact connected with the Phipps expedition is that
Nelson, the hero of Trafalgar and of the Battle of the Nile, then a lad of

fifteen, was a member of the party. Thus the boldest and strongest
spirits of the most adventurous and hardy profession of those days
sought employment in the contest against the frozen wilderness of the
north.
The first half of the 19th century witnessed many brave ships and
gallant men sent